The story of Ashi kotawa
by Ashi Kotawa
Summary: This is the story of a young girl with a forgotten and lost past.


Disclamer- I do not own the characters from the show/mangas Inu-yasha, I also do not own the character Tora-Yasha, she is one of my friends characters.

Please understand that my story is the story of one of my roleplaying characters.

Also the first jewel shards mentioned in this story are not the from the shikon no tama, they are my own creation, instead of increasing the powers of demons, and others, these shards increase defense.

Chapter 1-

Painful Memories

The night was young the sun had just set when the bell rang. Demons were attacking the village. As I woke from the screams i herd one in particular, my fathers, he was yelling

"Get the women and children out of here, guards keep it away from the shrine."

It dawned on me that demon must be after our jewel shards, many demons had attacked before, searching for the jewel shards but none had caused us to evacuate, this one must be very powerful,

_It's my duty as the headman's daughter to protect the jewel shards at all costs_

I leapt from my bed and ran to the shrine; luckily the guards had kept the demon at the gates of the village. I entered the shrine but there was no one in site, none of the village shrine maidens, no one. I hurried to get to the room where we kept the shards, as I reached the room I herd a large crash

_Oh my the demon must have made it into the shrine_

I reached for the shards wrapping them up in to a makeshift pouch and tying it to my kimono, I hurried to make my way to the side entrance because it was much closer then the main entrance. But I wasn't fast enough.

I saw my father and two other men standing at the other end of the hall, and then one of the younger looking men reach over to the guard next to my father and rips his head clean off.

_He…. He…. Ripped his head right off!_

And then the young man turn to my father and said in a calm deep voice

"Give me the shards"

My father did not answer, he just stood there, sword draw. Fearless he stood there in front of this terrifying man no demon, and then it was over. I had shut my eyes so I didn't see the final blow but when I opened them my father was laying on the floor. I wanted to run to him but the demon had spotted me and was now walking towards me. At first I just stood there frozen, terrified of this horrible creature. As he got closer I got a better look at him, he seemed to be no more then in his late twenties, and he seemed human, but I knew he was a monster.

I gather the courage to run for the side entrance, but he was fast, much faster then I. He caught my arm just as I reached the door. I turned to face him, but out of the corner of my eye I noticed there was a small ceremonial dagger hanging on the wall beside the door. I reached for it but it was just out of reach. I struggled with his grip so I could reach the dagger. I also tried to hit him with my free hand but it was no good. He then laughed and said,

"How pathetic, do you really think you can get away?"

Suddenly herd the twang of a bowstring, and an arrow hit this evil creature in the arm that he was holding me with. I looked to see who shot him and there standing over my father's body was my mother cursing. The demons arm released a strange dark substance that was slowly filling the air. It reached my mother first. She was only coughing at first, but the dark slowly took away her breath, and she fell her raven hair covering her face as well as my father's body. There was now the one thing keeping this monster from the shards. ME!

I grabbed the dagger and bolted out the side entrance. I didn't want to look back and tears slowly filled my eyes as I ran as fast as I could through the woods. I finally stopped running when dawn's first light was slowly creeping over the hills. I fell to my knees in a giant sob of tears, all I did was cry for the day, and I didn't care about being found or dieing for that matter. All I cared about was how my parents died for these jewels and for me. By late afternoon I had cried myself to sleep.

As I slept a small group of tiger demons found me and brought me back to their village. The leader of the group took me in as one of her own. Her name is Tora, which I found out the following morning when I woke to find my self in a clean bed and the cuts from running in the woods cleaned and bandaged.

For several years I lived with the tiger demons, Tora was very friendly and always told me stories. Through all those years I kept the dagger and the shards, never going anywhere with out them. One day 2 years after the attack on my home, I returned to the village of my parents. Only to find life as normal, though no one recognized me, I decided it would be best if I didn't say who I was, and aloud them to think that I was just a passing through wanderer who just wished to see the previous headman's archives. As I was looking through my fathers old papers I found one journal entry from about 5 years ago, it read,

'Today Hinrea and I found a young girl wondering the woods lost, she told us she didn't remember where she was from and who were her parent, we agreed on taking her in as our own daughter. We named her Ashi, Ashi Kotawa.'

I was shocked, all these years of living in this village and I never knew that I wasn't even born here, that I just came out of no where. I then decided to travel the country side searching for the answers to my past, when I got back to the tiger demon village I told Tora my plan, she just smiled and said

"As long as we meet again some day, I wish you the best of luck on your journey."

And so I set out the next day, a traveler at age 15. I stopped by my old village and took my father's old armor and one of my mother kimono's the one she had worn that night. I thought it good to try and forget that evil night. And so I went on my way.

On my way I ran into many obstacles and made many friends, also many demons followed me for my konta jewel shards, so I was not able to stay in one spot for very long. But one fateful day I found my self back at the tiger demon village, I asked if Tora was there but they all said she had left the village for her own reasons about two months after I had left. And so I went to our old hut I could make my shards undetectable as I traveled by using a special technique that a monk taught me, so that demons couldn't find them.

I ventured out looking for Tora, knowing that it might take me years to find her but I had to try. During my search I started hearing rumors of a half-breed demon named Inu-Yasha, and a young girl who was the reincarnation of a priestess. They were supposedly hunting for the shards of the sacred jewel. I later heard that a young fox demon, a monk, and a demon slayer had joined them. All I could think about this was

_What a strange group of people._

Today a slept by a small river and woke up to find myself surrounded by bandits. At first they thought I was a boy because I was wearing armor, but when they saw my face they laughed at me. I drew my dagger; I was prepared for a fight. Tora had taught me well in the ways of battle. But they only laughed again. They also asked

"Young lady do you really think you can fight us? Now be a good girl and give us your armor and all your money and we wont hurt you."

All I did was stand there, giving the leader a cold stare. He saw I intended to fight them, he replied to my stare

"As you wish"

He motioned for the smaller one of their group to attack me, and I easily evaded his attack. He glared at me and attacked again, this time to prove my skill, when he came at me I grabbed his wrist, flipped him onto his back and dislocated his shoulder. Then before I knew what was going on they all attacked

_Oops I guess I made them mad_

I thought as I evaded the first two attacks, but one guy caught me from behind. I was trapped, they had me. All i could think was how bad this was, they were going to get my Konta shards and then probably kill me. I started to wish Tora were here, when I heard a large snarl and

"Release her now!"

I couldn't see who it was but the first person I thought it could be was Tora. Then suddenly I was released and the man who was holding me was lying on the ground groaning, a rather large bump beginning to form on the top of his head. I finally got a good look at my rescuer and it wasn't Tora, but another of the tiger demon clan I remembered meeting him before. He used to come visit me and help me with my chores and training. He had always been nice to me. As I watched him take out the last two bandits, I kept thinking

_What is his name, why do I always forget names, what is it!_

He then turned to me and said

"Are you alright Ashi?"

I answered in a slightly annoyed tone

"I'm fine I can take care of my self, I didn't need to be rescued"

He mumbled some thing but all I could make out was

"Woman"

He took a few step towards me and handed me a note that said 'to Ashi from Tora' when I saw who it was from I immediately asked

"You saw Tora?"

He then went into the story of tora's return and how he had been sent to find me and protect me.

"Its all in the note"

He said, he paused a moment then asked

"Ashi why did you leave the safety of the village?"

I never answered that question, I had never told any one about my history and now I had forgotten it. There was an awkward silence for a long time then I asked

"So you're going to protect me?"

His answer was a simple nod and then he said

"It will be a great honor."

I just smiled and walked further down the path, he stood there for a moment and then followed, a slightly confused look on his face. As we walked I started to read the note, it said

'Ashi, I know you probably don't want Kitoro protecting you, and I know you can take care of your self but hummer me all right? Hope to see you soon, I will be heading out on a search, I hope to meet up with you at some point, love Tora'

_Well I guess I'll do as she asks, having him around couldn't be that bad. I mean he seems nice and was nice when I was at the village_

But I couldn't help but feel like I was forgetting something about him, but we went on our way. Soon we came upon a village, a very small one at that. As we entered all the people seemed to disappear into their homes avoiding at all costs. Io sighed and turned to Kitoro,

"I think there scared of you, lets get out of here"

So we left and found a large grove of trees, it was getting dark so we set up camp. As Kitoro made a fire I snuck away to see the surrounding area, while I ventured I came across a small hot spring, and it look so soothing that I just had to get in. soon I was disrobed and slowly wadding into the water, it felt so nice as I sat there in the spring. Time passed and Kitoro became worried, and wandered where I was so he went out looking for me.


End file.
